Shiran Victoria Shen studies how institutions and incentives influence climate and environmental actions. More broadly, she is interested in core issues in public policy and governance.
Her first book, The Political Regulation Wave: A Case of How Local Incentives Systematically Shape Air Quality in China (Cambridge University Press, 2022), has received major association awards, including the 2023 International Public Policy Association Early Career Research Award, the 2020 American Political Science Association Harold D. Lasswell Award, and the 2019 Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management Ph.D. Dissertation Award. It also received the 2017 American Political Science Association Paul A. Sabatier Award and the 2018 Southern Political Science Association Malcolm Jewell Award. Her second book, Compliance with Public Policy, is under contract with Cambridge University Press as part of the Elements Series in Public Policy.
Her research has appeared in leading journals such as the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Policy Studies Journal, and has received the 2025 American Political Science Association Evan Ringquist Award.
She holds a joint degree from Stanford University, where she was the first to earn an M.S. in civil and environmental engineering alongside a Ph.D. in political science, after graduating Phi Beta Kappa from Swarthmore College. During 2021-2022, she was a National Fellow at the Hoover Institution.
To learn more about her work, please visit http://svshen.com.
